anyone with an android device can find the WiFi Scanner in the google play store.
My question is, is there some sort of software for ubuntu that does the same or similar? wifi-radar is not at all what i'm looking for. I don't really mean to use aircrack-ng or anything like that either.
hell, if i could emulate or virtualmachine an android OS and actually run the wifi scanner app, that would be pretty cool.

network-manager is installed by default and polls for wireless networks. what makes wifiscanner better than networkmanager other than user interface?
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hbdgafSep 23 '12 at 4:28

network-manager is slow. when i turn on or off wifi sources, it's more effective for me to just disable wireless networking and then re-enable it to get an updated list of currently active networks and often it will list wireless networks that are long ago disconnected only because it remembers them from the past. networkmanager is a tool that works good for users wanting to use their computer to connect to network locations, it's not a good tool for wifi signal analysis.
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BenjaminSep 23 '12 at 14:33

so you're asking for a menu button in nm-applet that forces an iwlist wlan0 scan - file it as a wishlist bug
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hbdgafSep 23 '12 at 18:16